A/N: Thank you for the reviews on the last prompt! I'm so glad you guys are enjoying what I've written so far! Here's the next one!

G is for Gun

There's a reason she doesn't like guns. Sure, it stems from childhood trauma but there's more to it than that. She's reminded of that very fact as she sat in the uncomfortable waiting room chair, hunched over, staring at the blood on her hands. See the problem with guns is that they're so very permanent. Logan got shot by a gun. He's paralyzed. Zack got shot by a gun. Now he'll never be her brother again.

Kick someone's ass in hand to hand combat and they have a fighting chance. It's good sportsmanship. Shoot someone in the back and well...congrats on being the 'big man' in town. Fuckin' cowards. Of course, while a gun had caused this problem it could have also saved the day and stopped this moment from ever happening. But Max doesn't do guns. So she didn't have one. So it happened.

Mole had told her that she needed to bring one. She was stubborn though and refused. "I haven't needed a gun for years," she'd told him haughtily. She didn't really blame him for sitting as far away from her as he could possibly get even if what happened wasn't actually her fault.

When Gem came bursting in, a wailing Eve on her hip, Max winced and turned further in on herself. After all, Gem hadn't wanted Dalton to go on that mission. It was supposed to be easy, in and out and honestly he needed (and wanted) to learn these things. "He's too young" she had insisted, never mind the fact that they had all been doing much more dangerous missions from a much younger age. "Where is he?"

"Surgery," Mole answered gruffly. Gem's head swung around as she took in the sight of all the transgenics that had gone on the mission. Max, still staring at her blood stained hands. Priya, staring blankly up at the ceiling. Jericho, the only one who sadly met Gem's eyes.

It wasn't hard to figure out who else was missing. "Alec?" she whispered.

"Surgery," Mole repeated, somehow sounding even more gruff.

"What the hell happened?" she demanded.

It was quiet for a long moment as everyone waited for someone else to speak up. "Familiars," Priya finally answered. "It was an ambush."

"How did Dalton get hurt?" came the next question.

"Max ordered us to retreat...the kid thought he could still grab the intel," Jericho told her, keeping his voice carefully neutral. "He was wrong. Familiars turned their guns on him and…" he trailed off and looked away.

Max cleared her throat and forced herself to pick the story up. "Alec went after him. We all did but Alec was closest. Dalton got shot once in the back before Alec made it to him," she told her.

Alec had also shot to kill. So had Priya and Jericho and between the three of them they'd taken down five familiars after Dalton was shot. If Max had been carrying then she could have taken out the one that wasn't in their line of sight. The one that shot Alec three times. But Max doesn't do guns. Priya had taken him out. Too late.

"And Alec was shot too?" Gem asked, looking between the three that were there.

"Kid was shot three times," Mole finally spoke up.

Gem sank down into a chair beside the lizard-man. She clutched her daughter tight as she fought to keep a lid on her grief. Nothing has been confirmed yet. They could both come out of this just fine.

~DA~

To say Dalton came out of it "just fine" would be a bit of an overstatement. The good news was that he survived and didn't have any lasting paralysis. The bad news was that he needed to learn to walk again. He was transgenic though so he didn't really let that get him down. That's the best part about kids, they're resilient. Bounce back quick.

Alec wasn't much older than Dalton, only six years, but it was enough that he didn't bounce back quiet as easily. Well, that and he'd been shot more. Dalton owed him his life, he knew that. Alec had one rule before letting him join in on the mission. "Do whatever I tell you too." He'd broken it. He learned the hard way that there are some rules that you just shouldn't break. Because it might not be you that pays the price.

Dalton would sit through a thousand 'told ya so's' and would happily let Alec rip him a new one if the older man would just wake up.

~DA~

Alec didn't wake up though. Sometimes Max thought he was about to. She'd see a twitch of his fingers or a flicker of his eyelids. That's all it ever was though. False hope. Days turned into weeks, Dalton started walking again. He was released from the infirmary and went home with Gem. Alec still laid there though. She realized how unfathomable the thought of living without him, of leading their little city without him, had become. She hoped that she hadn't come to that realization too late.

"I get it, okay? You were overworked. I never let you have any time off because I'm the worlds biggest bitch. This is a little extreme though, don't you think?" she joked, her voice breaking a bit because she didn't actually find any of this funny. "Wake up and I'll give you every weekend off for a month," she bargained.

Hours later Joshua came in to relieve her. "Max get sleep. Joshua read to medium fella," he ordered as he waved a book in the air. She smiled gratefully, giving him a hug before stepping out of the room.

~DA~

Broken phrases entered his subconscious. Sometimes he heard Max's voice, other times Dalton's or Mole's. Right now he thought he heard Joshua's. He was talking in a steady tempo and, while Alec couldn't catch all the words, he had the vague feeling that he was being read to. The pain he felt as he floated closer to the surface of consciousness was almost unbearable. He did what he always did though and pushed through.

He heard the steady beep that had been the soundtrack in his head for- god, how long had it been?- pick up suddenly. Joshua's steady voice rose and was now talking rapid fire. Alec couldn't follow it at first as he struggled to open his eyes. Words slowly started filtering in, finally making some sense. He heard "Alec" and "Wake up" he heard another voice, calmer than Josh's. Then the air shifted around him and even though his eyes weren't open yet- why weren't they open yet?- he could almost see Joshua fleeing the room. Probably to get someone, he thought vaguely as he worked to open his cement sealed eyes.

The beeping was getting faster as pain flared through his body and he distantly realized that the beeping was his heart monitor. Finally, and it truly felt like the hardest thing Alec had ever done, his eyes opened. Just a bit. A tiny slit of hazel green barely visible to anyone looking at him. The world was blurry and although he knew someone was standing in front of him his eyes couldn't focus enough to make out who it was.

"Alec?" the person said. The voice was familiar but the pain roaring through his body up to his ears was making it impossible for him to decipher who it was. "Alec, you need to breath, okay?" he heard the words but they didn't make sense. Why wouldn't he be breathing?

The air was disturbed again and this time someone flew into the room rather than out of it. "He isn't breathing," the person told the new arrival. Were they talking about him? Someone grabbed his hand then and used the other to gently move his head so that it was facing them.

Her voice penetrated his pain fueled stupor. "Alec? I know it hurts but you need to take a breath, okay?" the world, what little of it he could make out, was starting to spin and his head felt like it was going to explode and float away all at once. He knew that voice though. He had never heard it sound so soft, not towards him. "Breathe Alec," she coaxed. "Please?"

So he did.

~DA~

Max's whole body relaxed as Alec let out the breath that he had been holding and drew in a new one. It was shallow and she could tell by the way his hand tightened around hers that it had hurt. "That's good, Alec," she told him soothingly as she brought her other hand up to his scalp, gently running her hand through his hair.

His eyes clenched closed and her stomach dropped at the little bit of hazel being hidden from her again. His next breath was a bit stronger though, more confident and the tiniest bit deeper. "Why is he in so much pain?" she demanded of Fen, the X4 who ran their medical unit, as the other transgenic bustled hurriedly around the room.

"We didn't want to give him morphine while he was unconscious because it could have made it harder...or impossible, for him to wake up," Fen explained calmly. Adding a muttered "also we have a very limited supply," under her breath as she brought the morphine filled syringe up to Alec's IV and smoothly injected it.

Max watched Alec's face as Fen watched his heart monitor. After a couple minutes his heart rate slowed to a less worrisome rhythm and the X4 let out a slow breath. It was Max's turn to hold her breath now as Alec's eyelids fluttered again. This time when they opened he met her eyes and she saw recognition flash through them.

"Max," he breathed out, his eyes and mouth still tight with pain.

"Shh, you did good Alec. Get some sleep now," she whispered back with a small smile.

"Owe me," he choked out, his chest rising rapidly as he fought off a cough. Max frowned as she tried to figure out what she owed him. Had he already realized that it was her fault that he was lying there is so much pain? Because she had refused to take a gun? Did he blame her as much as she blamed herself? A cough racked his tall frame but her heart soared as his lips turned up in a slight smirk. "Weekends off."

Max's eyes widened as she realized what he was referring to. He had heard her while he was still in a coma. She let out a laugh. Alec fell asleep, a small grin still on his lips. Her laugh turned near hysterical as tears burned at her eyes.

Joshua was behind her suddenly, his large hand on her shoulder. He smiled and shook his head as Max laughed, and cried, out her relief. Alec was still Alec.

~DA~

Alec was, indeed, still Alec. Unfortunately, like many past versions of Alec, being himself came with a heaping side of pain. Fen had told him that he was lucky that he'd waited as long as he had to rejoin the world of the living. One of the bullets that had hit him had punctured a hole in his heart that they'd barely managed to patch in time. Another had nicked his left lung and the third had hit the base of his spine.

While he'd been out of it his body had done it's best to repair the damage but as it continued to do so his damaged nerves snapped angrily at him as they worked to fix themselves. His breathing was still shallow and, more often than not, Fen made him keep the oxygen tubes in his nose. His chest throbbed and his head, which he was told hit the ground hard when he collapsed, pounded in time to his pulse.

None of that mattered though. None of it mattered because he could move his toes. That had been their biggest fear. Paralysis caused by the bullet that hit his spine. His toes moved though. Not much, but he could wiggle them and that was all that mattered because Alec was Alec. Alec was definitely, one hundred percent, not Logan. His image would be so completely destroyed if he had to wear robolegs. He shuddered at the thought of a wheelchair. Fen tested his reflexes as well and while the reaction was slight it was there.

Everyone, including Alec, was confident that he'd be up and walking in no time. First he just had to learn how to take deep breaths again.

~DA~

"Hey sleepyhead," Max greeted as Alec's eyes fluttered open. It had been two days since he'd woken up. He spent the majority of the last forty eight hours sleeping, having only woken up long enough to choke down some water, smile tiredly at his visitors and undergo a few tests to check for feeling in his legs. Max had never felt more relief than when he was able to wiggle his toes.

"Hey," he breathed out. She immediately caught his wince and reached over for a glass of water. She helped hold his head up as she brought it to his lips and watched him eagerly drink from it. When she took the glass away, not wanting him to overdo it, he cleared his throat. "How is Dalton?" he asked, his eyes looked clearer. The most aware he'd been since he first woke up.

"You don't remember?" she asked with a frown. Dalton had been one of his first visitors, alongside Mole and Gem. He shook his head. "You've been pretty out of it between the pain and the painkillers," she acknowledged softly. "Dalton is fine, thanks to you," she told him. "He took a bullet to the back and he had to do some intense PT to get back on his feet but thanks to Transgenic healing it didn't take too long."

"You good? Everyone else?" he asked next. His eyes roamed over her face and he frowned at how pale she looked, tired and with dark circle beneath her eyes.

"Everyone else is just fine. You and Dalton were the only one severely injured," she told him quietly, unable to keep the guilt out of her voice. Her head shot up, glancing down as she felt him take hold of her hand and gently squeeze it.

"Not your fault, Maxie," he told her quietly.

She shook her head but didn't answer. "How are you feeling?" she asked instead, changing the subject. "You look a little better."

A slight smirk graced his lips. "You sayin' I looked like shit?" he asked in mock offense.

She grinned and shrugged. "I'm saying you look a little less like shit now," she offered cheekily. He let out a scoff turned laugh turned cough. She ran her hand soothingly over his chest as she waited for the coughs racking his frame to calm. She smiled softly at him when he pulled his eyes back open. "I'm glad you're okay, Alec," she told him sincerely.

"You too, Maxie," he yawned before his eyes fell to a close again and his breathing evened out. She swallowed hard as she brought his hand up to her lips, pressing a chaste kiss to his knuckles before sighing and letting it go, standing up and heading back to command. She could hardly wait until Alec was out of medical.

~DA~

Alec grinned widely as he stepped out into the fresh air (well fresher than the air in the infirmary) and sunshine. He breathed deep and his smile widened at his ability to do so, just a tiny hitch in his lungs remained as evidence of the trauma he'd suffered. His legs were just the slightest bit shaky but it wasn't enough to slow him down as he practically ran away from the building that had held him hostage for the last two months.

He'd been awake for a little over three weeks, aware of his surroundings for about two and a half weeks and ready to go home for two weeks and two days. His trip to headquarters took a lot longer than it usually would have since he was stopped every three point five seconds to shake another hand and exchange another quip. He suddenly had the realization that for the first time in his life he had a hell of a lot of real, honest to goodness, friends. People who cared about what happened to him for more reason that just how much money it cost to make him. It was a good feeling.

He finally entered HQ and smirked as Mole glanced his direction. "Hey Scales," he greeted cheerfully.

"Fen clear ya?" the lizard man asked skeptically.

"Nice to see you too," Alec shot back as he searched out the person he'd really come to see.

"Mmm-hmm," his transhuman friend hummed in disbelief.

Alec's smirk grew. "Radio over to her. She was heartbroken to see me leave but it was time," he said in mock sorrow.

Mole scoffed and rolled his eyes. "Her majesty is in her office," he told the suddenly transparent younger man. Alec just grinned and gave him a nod before heading up the stairs.

Mole grabbed his radio and called over to medical. Fen answered almost immediately. "You clear Alec to leave?" he asked gruffly.

"God yes," Fen replied quickly. "Please don't send him back anytime soon. That man can't stay still...or quiet...to save his life!" the medic practically begged.

Mole chuckled at the desperation in the X4's tone. That was all he needed to know that his friend was back to normal. "Copy that," he chortled back, shaking his head as he set the radio back down and grabbed the paperwork he'd been looking over.

~DA~

Max's head snapped up as her door opened. She was about to yell at whoever the intruder was about what knocking was when Alec's head peeked in and her irritation was forgotten. "Heya Maxie," he greeted cheerfully as he let himself in. He looked over and his eyes lost some of their sparkle as he took in the sight of her guest. "Hey Logan, how's it hangin'?" he asked with his trademark smirk.

"Alec," the ordinary replied, the lines around his eyes showing his annoyance at the intrusion. "Good to see you up and about," he said graciously.

"Good to be up and about," the transgenic agreed with a nod. He turned to Max. "I just wanted to let you know that Fen cleared me and I'm headed home," he told her with a slight smile before turning to make his way back out of the office.

"Alec—" Max's voice stopped him and he turned back to face her, cocking his head in question. She glanced quickly at Logan before she turned back to him and smiled sincerely. "I'll come find you later," she told him. He returned her smile and ducked out of the office.

"Max…" Logan began before trailing off. He glanced between her and the door that Alec had just left through. "You know I just want you to be happy," he told her softly. "I was just really hoping it was me you'd be happy with," he finished sadly.

"In a different world...if I were a different girl then I think we would have been happy together Logan," she told him gently.

"So you and Alec then…" he trailed off again, unable to give the pairing a voice.

Max shrugged. "I don't know if anything will come of it but...I know that I have feelings for him," she admitted uncomfortably.

Logan scoffed. "Trust me, Max, the feelings aren't one sided," he told her somewhat bitterly.

"I'm sorry Logan," she told him sincerely.

He smiled sadly at her. "Don't be, Max. You and I haven't been together for a long time. Ever, really. We were over before we ever even began," he acknowledged painfully. He got up to leave but paused at the door. He didn't turn to face her as he asked. "If we had gotten the cure...or if you'd never been infected in the first place...do you think we'd still be having this moment?" he asked, his voice on the verge of breaking.

Max paused for a long moment as she considered his question and her answer. Truthfully? Probably. She had loved Logan once, she knew that for sure. Part of her always would. Still, even without the virus her world was so completely different from his. He just didn't...fit. "I don't know," she lied, her voice soft. He nodded once before pulling the door open and walking out. She sighed and slumped in her seat.

She allowed herself a moment of grief for the fledgling relationship that had never been realized.

~DA~

She knew that he still wasn't one hundred percent when he didn't answer after she knocked twice on his door. She could hear his tv on though so she knew he was home. She quietly let herself in and her lips immediately twitched up into a smile as she caught sight of him stretched out on his couch. One arm had fallen over the side of the couch, his hand grazing the floor, the other hand rested on his stomach, his head was tilted towards the tv screen but his eyes were closed and his breathing steady.

She walked around the couch so she was facing him and reached down to untie his boot laces, gently removing one and then the other before she stood back up to grab the blanket he'd had strewn over a chair. She had just started to place it over him when she looked back up to see him sleepily watching her. "Hey," she whispered, forcing herself to continue placing the blanket over him and ignoring the butterflies in her stomach as he lazily tracked her movements.

She was startled, the butterflies flapping their wings enthusiastically, when he reached out suddenly and grabbed her arm, pulling her down next to him so she was half laying on top of him. Her breath caught in her throat as she caught his gaze. "Look tired," he mumbled before pulling her even closer to him and closing his eyes again.

She hesitated, frozen in the moment as she watched him drop back off. She was tired. She'd hardly managed an hours sleep since Alec and Dalton had gotten shot. She made her decision and relaxed, pulling her legs up onto the couch and curling around him. Sleep claimed her quickly.

~DA~

When he woke up the next morning he was aware of something solid lying over half his body and his brows furrowed in confusion. He forced his eyes open and was surprised to see the something solid was Max. A vague memory of her covering him with a blanket and him pulling her down to lay with him filtered into his mind. He would have cursed himself for his impulsive carelessness except...she was still there. She had stayed.

He could tell the exact moment she woke up, her breathing increased in time to her heart rate and she tensed a bit before slowly turning her head to face him. He smirked a bit at the slight blush that crept up her cheeks. "Hey sleepyhead," he said, echoing her words from a few weeks earlier and breaking the tension.

Max cleared her throat and started to lift herself off of him but his arm came up and held her in place. "You stayed," he said and she quickly turned her head back to him when she caught the hint of awe in his words.

She shrugged like it was no big deal. "You were right," she admitted. "I was tired."

He brought the hand that wasn't holding her down up to her face, his thumb tracing the rings under her eyes gently, he was relieved to see that they weren't as dark as they had been when he'd seen her yesterday. "I know," he replied simply. His eyebrows rose in surprise as he caught her eyes darting down to his lips. His tongue unconsciously darted out to wet them and she seemed to take that as permission as she suddenly ducked down and pressed hers against his in an almost bruising kiss.

He groaned against the feel of her as he got over his shock and kissed her back heatedly. He didn't know how long they stayed there, fused at the lips, but his lungs tightened painfully and he heard the catch in his lungs. She did too because she immediately released him, pulling back enough to look into his eyes before ducking her head back down but this time instead of going for his lips she placed an ear over his chest and listened to his lungs slowly fill with air before slowly releasing it.

They stayed like that for a long moment. Alec wasn't entirely sure he wasn't dreaming and Max wasn't entirely sure she was ready to know what Alec was really thinking or feeling. He was the one to finally break the silence. It wasn't surprising since he didn't know how to stay quiet unless he was asleep. "Logan?" he asked hesitantly.

She pulled her head up and rocked back a bit so that there was bit of space between them and so that they could read every passing emotion on the other's face. "Logan and I are over," she told him confidently. "Never even really began, really," she continued, borrowing Logan's words.

"And...you and me…?" he questioned even more hesitantly.

She cocked her head as she searched his eyes. "Do you want there to be a you and me?" she asked, trying to ignore clenching in her stomach as she put the fate of the possibility of them in his hands.

His eyes widened at her question and she held eye contact as he swallowed roughly. "Max," he began, his voice a low rumble that sent heat flooding through her. "Are you saying you want there to be a you and me?" he asked, unwilling to be the first to put himself all the way out there.

She almost sighed when he dodged the question and forced the ball back into her court. "I'm saying…" she said slowly. "That if you can picture a future with me, and only me," she made clear, "then I can picture a future with you."

"And only me?" he asked, his voice rough with an unnamed emotion.

She lifted her eyes back to his. "And only you," she replied in a whisper. Her heart was in her throat now, the butterflies batting around as thought they were trying to break free as she awaited his answer.

His head surged up and he recaptured her lips and this time it was her that groaned into his mouth. She had never experienced such passion in a kiss and she realized that he was trying to tell her everything he didn't actually know how to say. She returned the kiss just as passionately to let him know that she understood. He broke it off before his lungs could start burning again. "only you, Maxie," he murmured against her lips, smiling as he felt hers curve up as well.

~DA~

"Sorry kid, Gem's rules," Alec said with an apologetic shrug as he put his gun into the waistband of his jeans and shrugged his jacket on.

"That's bullshit," Dalton grunted back. "You were hurt way worse. In medical for weeks longer than me and you get to go," he grumbled, sounding every bit the teenager he was.

Alec laughed and shook his head. "If you had listened to my orders last time-"

Dalton cut him off. "I know, I know. You told me so," he muttered good-naturedly, smiling a bit as he remembered his promise to endure a thousand 'told ya so's' in exchange for Alec healing. He figured he still had about eight hundred and sixty two to sit through before he could reasonably start complaining.

"Exactly," the older man said smugly before ruffling the hair on Dalton's head and sauntering off towards the van that the team would be taking on the supply run.

"You'll watch out for him?" Dalton asked as he caught sight of Max. It was the first run they'd been on since the shooting three months earlier.

Max looked up and smiled at Dalton. "You bet your ass I will," she replied haughtily before she moved to catch up with Alec. Mole came up alongside Dalton and the duo watched as Max rose up to her tiptoes and pressed her lips to Alec's in a quick kiss before turning to open the door.

Mole smirked around his cigar as he caught sight of the silver handled gun she had tucked against the small of her back. Her majesty was finally catching on.